Jim Dowd (Lewisham West & Penge MP) Retiring - May 2017

Can’t say I am shedding a tear over this. I hope the next elected member will be more engaged with local issues.

I’ll merge in the chat we had in Local Politicos:

While supporting the opt-in politicos category part of me thinks news of our MP for 25 years retiring from public service shouldnt just be on the main site. Regardless of your political persuasion this is big big news. Subsequent debate might of course need watching.

The Labour candidate will apparently be chosen by a panel of the National Executive Committee rather than by local members, supposedly because of the short timeframe.

Wow. Just wow.

I imagine the NEC could select a Vacuum Cleaner as Jim Dowds replacement candidate and it would still be elected in our ward

That is a shame. Mr Dowd always gave special attention to animal rights issues which frankly, in these selfish times we live in, are the only issues I have any interest in. He also always replied to any messages I sent him.

He will be missed.

Interesting thread over on the Sydenham forum where it’s claimed Jim was absolutely fundamental in bringing the Overground to FH and beyond. Something I wasn’t aware of.

https://sydenham.org.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=17229

Anybody heard any gossip about who the new Labour candidate might be?

No, but I’ve heard the selection will be done by the NEC rather than by the local party, due to time constraints, apparently.

This (http://www.jrc.org.uk/PDFs/ELLG-An-Enduring-Legacy-final.pdf) extensive report on the East London Line extension fails to mention him at all. Apparently the idea was first promoted in early 1997 by Lewisham Council, when he was an MP and the opposition’s Northern Ireland spokesman.

The Standard is speculating that it’s between Ellie Reeves, Vice Chair of the London Labour Party and Cllr Joe Dromey who has denied this on Twitter and is supporting Ellie.

With both parents still in parliament you can understand why Joe might prefer to wait to start his inevitable parliamentary career.

What have you heard Michael, if any

I met Cllr Dromey’s mother on Tuesday at a comedy night in Soho.

Spill the beans Martin

Gotta say as a trader “Who is Jim Dowd” He has never came to introduce himself to the local Traders.

Ask if he could be involved in our community.

And never got involved with any community events.

Happy forhim to go

To be fair to Jim without his support for the campaign by the previous FHTA Forest Hill would not have a Barclays Bank and he supported Forest Hill day every year.

To be fair he has never visited any of us & never supported anything we do for our community.

I’ve only been on the exec for 5 years & in this time he has never contributed, in any way. I couldn’t even tell you what he looks like

ETA Also to be fair I must add here @MajaHilton @Cllr_PaulUpex & Peter Bernard have been very supportive to FHTA & any events etc we’ve organise in the time I’ve been involved.

May I ask, what is Forest Hill Day?

May I ask who flagged this, it was just an Earth, Wind. & fire song & don’t see why it would offend anyone.

I definitely don’t think any mods would have flagged this, so just wondering & asking.

It certainly wasn’t me, but perhaps it was off topic?

You could well be right @topofthehill Thanks for mentioning. Hope you have a fab weekend

Interesting insight from @BrockleyCentral, regarding possible replacements for Dowd:

NEC’s timetable for selection of seats like ours is:

Timetable

Thursday 20 April 6pm - Deadline for MPs to declare intention to stand
Friday 21 April - Applications open for candidates in all seats
Sunday 23 April 12pm - Applications close
Week commencing 24 April - NEC officers long-list and interview candidates in retirement seats
By close of Friday 28 April - Candidates selected in retirement seats

It was flagged as being off-topic.

Meanwhile, John Russell is the LibDem candidate.

Congrats @JohnRussell!

Any thoughts on the likelihood of a local hustings? It’d be nice for some debate in this election.

Thank you Chris. Most appreciated.

John

I would personally be very happy to take part in any local hosting’s. The only one I am aware of at the moment is the Lewisham Pensioner’s Forum not date or venue has been confirmed as yet.

I understand that the Labour Party NEC will be making the appointment not local members and their candidate will be announced on Sunday evening.

I’ve got my fingers crossed for @JohnRussell he’s an amazing person that does so much for our community & in my opinion the best man for the job

Let’s not get into any expressions of support or otherwise on this thread. I think it would be fantastic to use to the forum to keep members aware of all events, hustings etc going on, but to do that and keep things ticking along, we need to make it a neutral noticeboard rather than a place for flag waving.

No problem Rachael, I understand

Was told by a very reliable source (and not anyone that has posted on this thread) today that he had input on Southern Rail, not the overground.

Wires (or tracks ) may or may not be crossed here.

Though I’d post this on this thread just incase anyone wants to register to vote

Register here by 22nd May to vote in the general election on 8th June

ETA Here’s a map of our constituency

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Worth noting that SE23 includes more than one constituency - for now. Jim Dowd is one local MP standing down, but Vicky Foxcroft is (as far as I know) standing again for Lewisham Deptford.

Any news on the Labour candidate?

According to Nykes post above we should know who the Labour candidate is on Friday.
All applications should have been received yesterday, so local party officials may know who the candidates for selection are (or possibly only the NEC knows), but I don’t know if that will be shared with party members or the public.

Have you noticed the new twitter account @ukelection_2017 it started following my shop, and others it’s following that I follow are you on the @FHSoc acc, John on @john4london, leaf & Groove, the library, & SE23Ldn - Might get the Labour candidate on there as soon as it’s public

This looks to be the most up-to-date list of candidates for the Labour PPC vacancy - I saw it on Twitter this morning, and it has been updated in the last few minutes:

An interesting shortlist:
Kevin Bonavia
Ibrahim Dogus
Jane East
Ian Kearns
Ellie Reeves
Christian Wolmar

With Ellie Reeves apparently the favourite.

Does anyone know who will be standing for the Conservative’s ?

No doubt a young, ambitious politician looking to cut their teeth on a hopeless cause before getting a shot in 2022 at somewhere like Eastbourne or Kettering.

I too hope someone will organise a local hustings. Last time FH Soc and SydSoc jointly organised one, which failed to happen because Jim Dowd wouldn’t share a platform with Dr George Whale (PhD in ‘cognition and creativity’ from Loughborough) of the extreme right wing Liberty GB party. The 38 Degrees campaigning network organised one at the Honor Oak pub which did take place, but which Jim boycotted - he sent a written statement explaining why. I was there. (So was Michael, I remember.) It was OK, but the audience seemed monotonously lefty. If I remember aright, the Tories and LibDems, as well as Dr Whale, participated.

Perhaps the FH and SydSocs will consider having another go this time?.

I think that misspelt either Labour or Lib Dem there, otherwise you’re on the wrong forum.

Sure @anon5422159 will get this up as soon as it’s announced

Dying to get the shortlist on here!

Lib Dem - @JohnRussell - Local
Conservative -
Labour -
Green Party -
UKIP -

Please add all,

One of our regular members recently told me #politicos:general-politics was becoming a “right-wing echo chamber”…!

I noticed that too - there were two pro-Conservative posts in a row. Disgusting

Changing the subject a little guys, I think this will be a time for Lib Dems to get started

From the chair of the East Lewisham Conservatives:

Should probably add Green and UKIP as they placed respectively 3rd and 4th in 2015.

And being a Brexit supporting Tory don’t i know it!

@LukeSlatford calls himself a Tory. But he is a Liberal through and through.

Christian Wolmar is a transport expert. Would his expertise help us in getting the best public transport for Forest Hill? Could he lead a project to build a tunnel for the so-called South Circular?

Brexit means Brexit for me - which makes voting Lib Dem a challenge…

Can we keep the conversation here factual, please? The main forum needs to be a reliable source of information on the election and while I’m all for friendly chat on most threads, there is a danger here of getting sidetracked into political discussion.

Apologies i thought this was under Politicos

MPs don’t often truly ‘lead’ these types of projects really, though they often claim they do. They can lobby for them, but of course transport would be a TfL (ie mayoral) responsibility in London so parliament isn’t even necessarily the best place to make a difference on that issue.

My first post.

Not a fan of the Labour Party but it seems Ellie Reeves was born, grew up and lives in Lewisham. Surely that puts her in the lead to get the nomination. Then judge her on how effective she is.

Welcome to SE23.life, @BringOutTheCranston - I remember you from the old forum.

There’s a difference between being liberal and supporting the Lib Dems who are a social democrat party.

Cheers Chris.

From a politics editor at The Guardian:

Wow.

I know that. But @LukeSlatford doesn’t.

Would that mean Damon would hang out in the 'hood?

As much as Dowd did? Probably!

Welcome @BringOutTheCranston. We have a dedicated Politicos section for all political debate. It’s an opt-in, if you want to join.

I can see I’m going to have fun keeping this thread on the straight and narrow! Those who should know better, consider yourselves warned.

Great to have you on here @BringOutTheCranston

@RachaelDunlop I always listen to your warnings so I’m being good on this thread now

You’ll get there Luke, BTW was lovely to meet you the other day

Haha I’m an outer, just saying

Aw, mom, we were just saying hi to the new kid!

There’s now a topic that will list our local general election candiates as they’re announced.

It’s a wiki-post, which all verified members are able to edit - please help by adding candidates as they’re announced. Thanks!

Looks likely from this Huffington Post piece that Ellie Reeves will be the candidate to replace Jim Dowd.

So far as I can make out, she is on the right of the party and opposed Brexit?

It seems Ellie Reeves has the nomination. Willlook forward to catching up with her.

Not a Corbynista, but I don’t think that amounts to being on the right

I gather she was the choice of the unions as well.

As a barrister specialising in employment law, who has been on the NEC for some years, you can see why.

She’s obviously going to be attacked as part of the previous Labour Party establishment - married to one MP, sister to another - but I think the Labour Party needs the sort of professionalism such experience is likely to bring.

I am thrilled that the NEC has picked up a great local candidate, Ellie Reeves, whom I have know personally well before this election. I actually wrote to NEC saying that a local connection in our case should be considered imperative as we had a few outstanding local members who applied for the post.

Deadline for nominations for General election is 4th May 4pm, therefore we should know the full candidate list soon after.

4 posts were split to a new topic: Ellie Reeves (MP candidate) - is she local?

I’ll be operating a ‘three strikes and you are out’ rule on opinion-based posting here. Pauline - here’s your second knuckle-rapping.

I don’t want to stifle debate, but rules is rules.

Agree with Rachael.

I have moved a few posts into the opt-in Local Politics category. Let’s focus on the pure facts here and save the debate for our opt-in politics groups.

Sorry Rachael, I tend not to look at the category when I pop in & out, but will make a point of checking now, especially on this subject.

Fair play & you are right on this

Spoilsports.

I’ve just remembered the local Conservative office is on D Rd, I’ll give a knock when I see someone in there to ask when their candidate will be announced.

Wow. You mean to say that the office is still in use? Have never seen any evidence of activity there so had assumed it was defunct, a bit like the Catford club.

Yippee it still is - though they look like they are asleep every day

8 posts were split to a new topic: Family dynasties in politics

Does it really matter who Stands? It is a safe labour seat and will continue to be so, any candidate will either sit pretty and not do much or will use it as a learning experience for future party promotion.
Will be surprised if Conservatives even field a candidate.

Safe seats are often used to parachute voted-out party grandees or former ministers back in, see Esther McVey in the aforementioned Tatton, so good to see Labour not play the same game and keep the seat open until the last minute in case of a return of Balls or David Miliband or even given today’s raft of interviews The Second Coming, 20 years on from the first

I tweeted Lewisham Conservatives. They responded.

https://twitter.com/SamThurg/status/859390023636004864

Good riddance - I’ll be voting with my head and therefore conservative. A wasted vote in such a stitched up seat, but there’s no way I could ever vote for Labour in the current state.

Well at this rate there may not be a Conservative candidate to vote for.

This time I’m going to vote for who I think will be out best constituency MP. The national parties are all a load of old shit.

Wasted, perhaps, but it will be interesting to see what the Conservative candidate can do to erode Labour’s 12,714 majority. The Tory got 24% of the vote here in 2015.

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thats why O’Dowd is good riddance But I agree that a good constituency MP is an overlooked strength

24% was in fact a drop in share from 2010 though overall votes remain pretty much the same. The massive swing to Jim Dowd’ of 9.5% was largely due to the collapse of the LibDem vote. LibDems came in 2nd in 2010.

Given the majority opinion on Brexit, and that local hero John Russell is standing I’m going to guess the LibDem’s will do much better this time out.

I’d be surprised if the Conservatives bother to put up a good candidate for any Lewisham constituency. Which begs the question why wouldn’t you vote for the best person for Lewisham West & Penge.

I think the Conservatives put up someone quite reasonable last time. They might not have much of a chance here and now, but it’s a way for them to try out someone who might later move on to a more winnable seat, or if this seat becomes more winnable. How do they stand up to pressure? Can they deal with nutters without causing unnecessary offence? - there are a lot of nutters about. As long as a party holds out reasonable hopes of getting someone to be an MP, there’s no reason why it should have to offer anywhere a no hoper, even in a no hope constituency.

A quick reminder that this thread is in the main forum not Politicos and not the place for declarations of political allegiance or allegations of shenanigans

He might have a serious chance of winning if the Greens stood down and supported him.

Does anyone know whether the new Labour candidate was (or is) pro-remain?

What she says:

One of the things that has come up on the doorstep is the question of hard Brexit – people really want to see Labour showing that we are opposed to the hard Brexit that the Tories are pushing through.

What we are saying is that on day one of a Labour government we would guarantee the rights of the 3 million EU citizens living in this country.

We would also seek to negotiate remains part of the Single Market – because that’s the way we are going to secure jobs and prosperity for people in Lewisham West and Penge, and it’s a message that really resonates here.

Source here

I don’t think that is the key issue anymore. It is rather whether she will obey the party whip when the House votes.

You’ll find that this is Theresa May’s priority too, but its the charming EU who are playing bully.

I suspect our mods will move this last comment to the Politicos section …

That’s cool.

I won’t move anything if you could just move yourselves… This is a very tricky thread to moderate but it’s so important and interesting, I am hoping members will help me by remembering why we have a Politicos section. A few of the more recent comments would justify being relocated, but if the members concerned refrain from further infractions, I’ll turn a blind eye.

Quite right. The future of our country is a minority interest and should be left to politics nerds. It would be incredibly irritating for the rest of us, who want to read about coffee shops,craft beer etc, to be constantly distracted by people droning on about health, education, housing, Brexit etc, which are after all quite irrelevant to us in Forest Hill Village.

No one suggested politics is unimportant.

It’s simply that we have a well-established group for it on the forum. A group that people are free to opt in to if they want to.

We’ve been over this a number of times, and it’s not fair on the original poster of this topic to continue the debate about our Politicos group here.

Let’s stay on-topic and respect the fact that this political topic is in the open area of the forum so it is not the place for ping-pong debates about general politics, or the strategy of this forum.

Just been having a chat with the Green Party candidate for Lewisham West & Penge and it’s a young lady called Karen Wheller -

Thanks @Pauline, and also @Starman who helpfully updated our candidates list

There is rumour that Liberty GB may stand again. This time they’re hoping to top 100 votes.

He’s got a bigger family now, has he?

If someone does stand for Liberty GB, I’ll have to give warnings for posts like those last two. What IS the world coming to?

To be scrupulously fair, @starman’s was a perfectly valid statement of fact. They got about 80 votes last time. My comment? Maybe not so much a statement of fact - just trying to make the world a safer place for intelligent discourse by remorselessly ridiculing outrageously offensive candidates.

I’ll get my coat…